Dllhost.EXE Execution Anomaly
Detects a "dllhost" process spawning with no commandline arguments which is very rare to happen and could indicate process injection activity or malware mimicking similar system processes.
Detection logic
selection
Image|endswith: \dllhost.exe
CommandLine:
- dllhost.exe
- dllhostfilter_main_null
CommandLine: nullCondition
selection and not 1 of filter_main_*Raw YAML
title: Dllhost.EXE Execution Anomaly
id: e7888eb1-13b0-4616-bd99-4bc0c2b054b9
status: test
description: Detects a "dllhost" process spawning with no commandline arguments which is very rare to happen and could indicate process injection activity or malware mimicking similar system processes.
references:
- https://redcanary.com/blog/child-processes/
- https://nasbench.medium.com/what-is-the-dllhost-exe-process-actually-running-ef9fe4c19c08
- https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/static-assets/documents/malware-analysis-reports/goofy-guineapig/NCSC-MAR-Goofy-Guineapig.pdf
author: Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)
date: 2022-06-27
modified: 2023-05-15
tags:
- attack.privilege-escalation
- attack.stealth
- attack.t1055
logsource:
category: process_creation
product: windows
detection:
selection:
Image|endswith: '\dllhost.exe'
CommandLine:
- 'dllhost.exe'
- 'dllhost'
filter_main_null:
CommandLine: null
condition: selection and not 1 of filter_main_*
falsepositives:
- Unlikely
level: highFalse positives
- Unlikely